erable by marrying him?"

He looked at her aghast. "Who are some of the others?" he asked, with
despair written on every feature. "Is Joe Whitney one of them?"

"Joe Whitney!" Alice laughed merrily. "Mercy, no! Joe is entirely
without resources. If it wasn't for his family troubles, I shouldn't
know what in the world to talk to him about."

Allen began to be suspicious. The girl's manner was far too flippant to
be genuine, but he would not for the world give her the satisfaction of
knowing that she had worried him.

"If you have so many, why can't you add me to the list?"

"You? Oh, that would never do! You would be sure to think I meant it,
and the first thing I knew you would try to make me marry you."

"Of course I should. Don't you want to be married?"

"Marriage is an institution for the blind," she laughed back at him.

"Then that's where I want to be confined."

Alice sat up very straight. "Then you had better run right along and
find your guardian," she urged. "We business women have no time for such
trifles."

"So you shirk your responsibility, do you?" Allen looked at her so
reproachfully, and spoke with such quiet firmness that she ceased her
bantering.

"What responsibility am I shirking?" she demanded.

"Me; I am the greatest responsibility you have, and you are neglecting
me shamefully."

Alice gave evidence of becoming amused again, but he gravely checked
her.

"For once I am serious, if you can be made to believe it. When we met so
accidentally in Washington--well, I was a joke then, I admit; but it's
different now. You gave me some new ideas to think about, and the more
I've thought about them the more I've seen things your way. And ever
since then I've tried hard to do what I thought would please you. But
now I'm sick of the whole thing. It may be all my fault; but, anyhow, I
wish I were well out of it."

"Why, Allen Sanford!" Her voice showed astonishment and reproach.

"I do," he insisted. "I'd give a whole lot right now if I knew that I
never had to go back to the office again."

Alice was genuinely shocked. "I can't understand you," she said,
soberly. "If you had felt this way at the beginning, I shouldn't have
been so much surprised; but now, just when you are getting to a point
where you could be useful to father and to yourself, you begin to show
the white feather."

"You mustn't say that, Alice," the boy replied, quickly, his tone
showing that she hurt him. "It isn't quit